1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method for managing a configuration of clustered computers, a controller for managing a configuration of clustered computers, an arrangement for managing a configuration of clustered computers, and a computer program distribution medium readable by a computer and encoding a computer program of instructions for executing a computer process for managing a configuration of clustered computers.
2. Description of the Related Art
Clustered computers are used in many applications, such as in computer networks, telecommunications systems and radio telecommunications systems.
Configuration management of clustered computers is a laborious task. The configuration management of clustered computers includes the software configuration management of clustered computers. The configuration information related to the process of software configuration management and role assignment in a running computer is called deployment data of the computer. The deployment data includes deployment data structures. Configuration management can be performed with the use of deployment data structures. Deployment data structures define the configuration of functional entities, such as nodes and/or processes, which are present in clustered computers.
Traditionally large systems have supported the management of the deployment data. Typically there is some support in the user interface and the software itself to enable the creation of predefined deployment data structures, based on concepts of node types or functional unit types, for example. However the rules concerning the valid deployment structures are more or less hardwired with the software code. This approach makes the system inflexible. Whenever there is a need to change predefined deployment structures, to introduce a new node type or functional unit type, for example, the related software code has to be changed as well.
The amount of deployment data increases with the size of the computer and the number of computers. It is very laborious for the operator to create and maintain deployment data manually if there are dozens or even hundreds of nodes in one computer. The number of managed objects is in the order of magnitude higher than the number of nodes: there are hundreds or thousands of objects in the deployment. Thus one problem is how to make the management of the deployment data easier for the operator.